"What allowance is there for high risk seekers in our society?"

IMO, it goes back to one of the two basic Natural Laws: Do not encroach on other persons or their property. You want to do something dangerous? Fine! Just make sure it doesn't negatively affect anyone else -- limit the danger to yourself. Don't go 4-wheeling at high speeds with your kids or dog in the car. If you're a free climber, make sure your life insurance is paid up. Don't do tricks in front of moving trains -- you're just not able to understand how much it eats at the crews to have to run back and apply pressure to the heart side of your cut-off legs, or look for multiple body parts.

CanoeDogs: "...outside of the rail guys did something else bring that on or does it just seem like there is a lot more "stupid" going around lately..."

The rail guys are a constant source of stupidity stories. So is what's going on in the rest of the world, which I find even more frustrating.

Last night there was someone driving a car all over the freeway at a high rate of speed. A few minutes later, it looked like the same car upside down off the side of the freeway, two cars had stopped -- I didn't. On the way home, there was another rollover crash at the center divider. Further south another car passed me (but not so fast), on the almost-empty freeway. He kept activating his turn signals and changing lanes, despite there being no one near him. He sped up and then slowed down, changed lanes back and forth, the suddenly sped off I-5 onto an interchange, from the inside lane.

I don't give a rat's patootie if people maim or kill themselves, but I am tired of them killing, injuring or maiming other people in the process.

Sue

High risk is just that, high risk, and if someone wants to continually try to push the envelope; practice until they get it that's fine, that is how we advance.

Showing all your failures in the process on YouTube, now that's stupidity.

Bill

Is this a refinement on the work of Dr. Henry Goddard? He started a clssification system similar to yours in the 1920s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_H._Goddard

His system was much simpler. Moron, imbecile, idiot, in descending order.

Good work Sue. You have the makings of a great PhD thesis here.

on a tangent, I believe we could build a suitable upscale section for improving intelligence graduations.

We could start with book smarts, progressing to applied knowledge, common sense, rational reasoning, wisdom, revelation, and ending with political savvy (for everyone knows that no one can win a political argument these days, so it must be at the top). That would make this all a perfect circle then I reckon.

Thus we could show that some people are just to darned smart for their own good.

Yes, oldsoldier, I suspect it is the same with all of us. And I would guess that those of us who have beaten the odds after doing some dumb and really stupid stuff over the years are trying (or have already tried) to instill our kids with enough common sense to minimize the dumb and stupid events in their lives as well.

LOve Patrick McManus! Ya this was a great post Susan.

Ya funny story, I was doing something stupid one time in my youth. My dad caught me doing and proceeded to chew my posterior. I asked him how he knew the out-come would turn out bad. He responded "because I tried the same thing at your age and I got really hurt! Now stop doing that!" That was classic, but it made me stop.

'Notice there's no rating better than "DUMB"'

Oh, I was only going for the negative aspect here. I know quite a few people with working brains, many of them at this forum.

I wouldn't want to go for a PhD on this, either. I was planning on applying for a $30 million government grant where I could study the psychology of red cars: Do crazy drivers always buy red cars, or does buying a red car make normal people crazy drivers?

But I don't think they're giving out much in the way of grants these days... I was hopeful after I read about the big money that was given to people to study which kind of people had the worst body odor, the color preferences of mice, why prostitutes in South America drink so much, etc.

Always a day late and a dollar shy. *sighs* Do you think Toyota would go for it???

Sue

True-its better to learn from other's mistakes, rather than make your own!

Pfft. A REAL [whatever] knows they can do a better job of it, and it'll work for them!

I'm convinced that's why there are so many stories of someone trying the same stupid act they just watched someone else totally fail at.